The men transforming Battersea Power Station

Battersea Power Station is one of Britain’s most recognisable buildings, and
it is being turned into luxury flats. Max Davidson meets the men
entrusted with designing Britain’s most desirable new residence

One of Britain’s best-loved buildings is now its most exciting building site. When it was announced that after nearly 30 years of wrangling, Battersea Power Station was finally to be brought back to life, property tongues were set wagging. Just across the river from Chelsea, the old industrial behemoth would become one of the capital’s smartest addresses. What would the new apartments look like? Who would be doing the design?

Still, there were few surprises when Michaelis Boyd Associates were announced as the answer to the second question. The firm has been chosen to design 254 luxury apartments in phase two of the development. They are a smart company for a smart project. Such high hopes are riding on the landmark development that the Malaysian consortium which owns the building was never going to look in the Yellow Pages. It wanted the best.

Michaelis Boyd is to act as interior residential architects for phase two, teaming up with heritage architecture specialist Wilkinson Eyre. Work has already begun on the restoration of the power station, which has dominated the London skyline since 1933.

But the coal-fired power station that used to belch fumes over the capital has suddenly become hip. When units in phase one of the development – Circus West, a residential complex to the west of the power station – went on sale last January, they sold out in four days, netting £600 million. With the London property market booming, there is every reason to expect equal enthusiasm when the second phase comes on the market on May 1.

To land the contract, Alex Michaelis and Tim Boyd had to travel to Kuala Lumpur last autumn and see off competition from an American and an Australian firm, which had also been shortlisted.

Industrial luxury: artist’s impressions of how Battersea Power Station will be redeveloped

“Our vision was for something that didn’t look like a normal high-end development, that was a little bit more raw,” says Michaelis. “The look will be eclectic, but also site-specific.”

“As far as possible, we will work with materials that are already there,” adds Boyd. “That will mean making maximum use of the brickwork and referencing the remaining metalwork. We will be working with the heritage of the building to create something that is still very tactile.”

Of the two men, Michaelis comes across as lighter, smilier, while Boyd is a touch more earnest. But their successful collaboration is not based on the attraction of opposites, like Lennon and McCartney.

Both men seem to be slightly in awe of the power station, which is the largest brick building in Europe: impressive from a distance, but absolutely humungous when you get up close. “You could fit St Paul’s Cathedral into the main boiler house,” explains Michaelis. “You could even fit in the Gherkin, if you laid it flat.”

The Grade II listed power station was erected in the Thirties, to a design by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, and expanded after the Second World War. It became one of London’s most recognisable buildings, held in affection – like the gasometer beside the Oval cricket ground – despite not being obviously beautiful. But after being decommissioned in 1983, it had a chequered history. Several redevelopment plans fell by the wayside and, at one point there were fears that it would have to be demolished.

How the flats could look inside

But Londoners who have become attached to the structure, in particular its four huge towers, can rest assured. “The towers are going to be taken down brick by brick while the redevelopment work is taking place, but then put back up again,” adds Michaelis. “One of them is going to be restored with a glass lift inside.”

Plans for the Art Deco central control room, with its wrought-iron staircases and vast forest of dials and other equipment, are a bit more uncertain. “Some people have had the thought that it could be reinvented as the most expensive cocktail bar in London,” jokes Michaelis.

The Michaelis Boyd-designed apartments will be within the existing facades of the western and eastern flanks of the building and on top of the central boiler house. “We are going to be offering two slightly different looks, reflecting the fact that Battersea Power Station was built in two stages, pre- and post-war,” says Boyd.

There will be more than 100 different types of apartment, with some “edgier” than others, using distressed materials such as unlacquered brass. No detailed plans are available yet, but expect big free-standing copper baths, handmade tiles and brass rails. There will also be plenty of exposed brickwork, of course.

“People don’t want to live in some bland modern development that could be anywhere in the world,” says Boyd “They want to be part of the power station, and its history. That means being part of the brickwork.”

Statements like this may help to reassure critics of the redevelopment. Some have claimed that the site will become an enclave for foreign wealth. There are also fears that in becoming a luxury hotspot, the power station will lose the charm that has made it such a beloved part of the skyline.

Michaelis Boyd has considerable experience working with this kind of history. Adapting one-time industrial premises to the requirements of a more leisurely age is very much its métier. One of its most trumpeted projects, Soho House Berlin, used to be a department store and before that a factory. “There was plenty of raw brick and raw concrete, so we tried to get back to the basic structure by exposing everything,” says Michaelis. The firm was also responsible for David Cameron’s eco-friendly home in Notting Hill, which attracted publicity for a wind turbine erected on its roof.

Among its current projects is the Williamsburg Hotel in New York where, true to the pair’s instinctive love of raw ingredients, they are retaining the old water-tower on the roof – which more timid architects would probably have torn down as an eyesore.

At Battersea Power Station, they are hoping to attract what they call “creatives” – movers and shakers in the arts and media. Twenty years ago, a lot of these buyers would have turned their noses up at south London. It is only the most obvious example of a trend in cities around Britain. From York to Leeds, old buildings are being repurposed into cutting-edge contemporary residences.

Still, the prices at Battersea take some beating. They start at £800,000 for a studio and go up to £4 million for a four-bedroom apartment. This reflects the prestige of an £8 billion project that is set to transform the surrounding area. In particular, when it is accessible by the Northern Line extension, scheduled for completion in 2020.

“We have tried to think of what might appeal to our clients in this area,” adds Michaelis. “They are not going to want to tramp up and down stairs all their lives. The thought of moving to a big apartment in a landmark development in Battersea could be exciting. That old divide, between north and south of the river, is shrinking the whole time.”

If you had told employees of the old Battersea Power Station that flats in their place of work would one day change hands for millions of pounds, they would have laughed. But London, not for the first time, has adapted with imagination and panache.

DID YOU KNOW?

The station has appeared as a backdrop to a host of movies and TV series, from Hitchcock’s 1936 film Sabotage to Dr Who and the Beatles’ 1965 film Help!

Sir Giles Gilbert Scott was also responsible for Liverpool Anglican Cathedral and the red telephone box. Bankside power station, another of his projects, now houses the Tate Modern art gallery.

In a 1939 survey for The Architectural Review, the power station was voted the UK’s second favourite modern building.

The station consumed one million tons of coal a year and, at its peak, supplied a fifth of London’s electricity.

In 1977, the towers appeared on the cover of the Pink Floyd album Animals, with an inflatable pig floating above it.

One of the many redevelopment plans was to turn the site into an industrial history theme park. It was shelved in 1989.

In 2008, it was reported that Chelsea FC was considering a stadium on the site, with a retractable roof and a seating capacity between 65,000 and 75,000.